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Originally posted by Munin the Raven:[*]In the servant conversation, the woman comments on "never seeing the river so low" and that "you can almost walk across at Shalebridge". The male sevant replies "wouldn't New Market love that". I'd think this would mean that the two districts are adjacent, but if anyone has any other ideas on the meaning of such a comment, say so.

I would say that the river runs past Shalebridge in the northern part of the City (with Shalebridge southwest of the river), and that Shalebridge must be a common approach to New Market from the north. A river that can be forded in multiple places would increase southbound pedestrian and cart traffic to New Market. They need not be adjacent, so long as reaching the one often involves traversing the other.

Originally posted by Digital Nightfall:Fog usually happens when there is alot of moisture in the air and the temp goes from cold to hot or hot to cold very quickly, which is why it's common to have fog in the morning or evening.

Yes, it fogs here in Florida.

Okay, howcome in LOTP, Garrett says its a "hot night in the city" and it is foggy... does this say it is coming in cold at night? Or was cold in the day and coming in warm?

Mebbe its pollution fog?

Aie! The developers probably just put int to look nice without thinking that people would try and work out the games weather patterns from it

"Where is the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing? They have passed like rain on the mountains, like wind in the meadow. The days have gone down in the west, behind the hills, into shadow. How did it come to this?" - Theoden

Originally posted by Grundbegriff:Is there any evidence of such developments in the mines at Cragscleft?

There is electricity (think safety lamp) This may have been how electricity was developed in the City, but of course it may not.

The idea of a network of mines running under Dayport seems quite unlikely to me, especially given how architecturally developed Dayport seems to be.[/QUOTE]

There may have been mines there once, just before Thief takes place. Most large towns started out as small villages catering for a particular industry, such as mining, and grew over time, eventually eclipsing how the area started out.

P.S. I don't doubt that the word Dayport has nothing to do with mines, but the City probably has something to do with mining as it is one of the fe industries we know exist in Thief, like overseas exports.

Originally posted by Oliver Gregory:Most large towns started out as small villages catering for a particular industry, such as mining, and grew over time, eventually eclipsing how the area started out.

I could be wrong, but I doubt that villages were built over the mines on which they depended. The usual configuration, I believe, would have been that a village arose near the mouth of a mine which was bored into some elevated terrain such as a hill or mountain. Exceptions exist, I imagine. Still, the idea that Dayport would be developed on potentially unstable terrain seems unlikely, and the only evidence to support such a notion is that "day" is technical mining jargon for the surface above a mine. While I admit that this may mean that the area of Dayport (near the water, away from elevated terrain) was mined in the City's early days, I suspect mines such as Cragscleft are actually in foothills on the City's periphery.

P.S. I don't doubt that the word Dayport has nothing to do with mines, but the City probably has something to do with mining

That much is clear. One of the missions actually takes place in a mine.

Any chance this map (the ASCII one) is going to change any time soon? If not, I will go ahead and have the CoSaS artists use it as a guide to edit some of our existing city maps to reflect this more studied and acurate version of The City layout.

Sounds good. My CoSaS artists will probbly change some things of course, to better fit the fiction of COT/CoSaS (probbly more additions then changes) but all of this it just fan-art anyway, and will probbly be rendered assunder and torn to bits by Thief 3 anyway.

Here's map #1 of 3, which corrects the misleading map that Garrett used in ASSN. This map, based on in-game measurements, shows the correct proportions of the streets that run through New Market, and shows the passageways omitted in Garrett's map. Farkus's shop, Garrett's apartment, and the entrance to the Lost City are marked with initials. The fortified wall surrounding New Market is shown in red. (Note: this fortification is not the same as the barricade that surrounds a section of the Old Quarter!) All known canals are marked in blue. They flow from the northern canal that leads (I presume) to the River (not shown), and flow southward through New Market, exiting westward near the entrance to Karath-Din. (Note: this westward path of the canal fits well with the idea that the Ambush/Courier neighborhood is in the New Quarter to the west, south of Shalebridge and southwest of HighTowne. Map #2 shows this connection).

It's clear that Garrett's apartment isn't in DownTowne, since if it were there would be no reason to mark "DownTowne" on the map. Likewise, it makes sense that Garrett would identify his area as "Home Turf" rather than use the proper name of the district, since he knows the name of his neighborhood. This too suggests that his apartment is in a district not otherwise named on the map. For these reasons, and others mentioned above, I've placed Garrett's apartment in the South Quarter.

Originally posted by Oliver Gregory: but the City probably has something to do with mining as it is one of the fe industries we know exist in Thief, like overseas exports.

One minor problem with the mine theory: The Lost City. That's pretty much slap underneath the new City and at not too huge a depth. It at least stretches from the middle of the City to the sea and probably more: possibly out to the Cragscleft area or beyond. Any significant mining industry in that area would be bound to come through into the lost city sooner or later, especially if the lost city is more extensive than the areas in T1 and T2 (which it almost definately will be - you don't get civilisations like the Precursors on small scales, think Ancient Egypt size building efforts) Have a look at Aaron Graham's Keeper Theses on the Circle, especially http://www.thief-thecircle.com/guide...es/history.asp and http://www.thief-thecircle.com/guide...es/hammers.asp . If the material in these is to be taken as valid (I think so, they seem an accurate account of, and logical deduction from, the game material) then it's possible that the only recorded unintentional intrusion into the lost city was under Cragscleft during the temple construction (I base this on the following: if a gemstone with necromantic powers is involved in the destruction of the lost city, a gemstone is found in Cragscelft with similar powers and then another stone turns up in a Hammer Cathedral with the same powers the chances are they are one and the same. Talking, necromantic stones with an ego are not common.) While it is not inconceivable that excavations under the City opened into tunned in the lost city, it it fairly unlikely otherwise there would be a large number of artifacts of Precursor construction around the city - this didn't happen at Cragscleft because of the trouble caused by the gem.

So the miners were either very, very lucky or the lost city is a lot deeper that it would appear to be from T1. Or there were no mines. My money is on the latter as itavoids some thorny problems, YMMV of course.

Originally posted by TheWatcher:One minor problem with the mine theory: The Lost City. That's pretty much slap underneath the new City and at not too huge a depth. It at least stretches from the middle of the City to the sea and probably more: possibly out to the Cragscleft area or beyond.

The City is pretty large. Since we know that canals pervade the City and since all that water must be coming from somewhere, we can posit modest mountains as the source of the River, and the River as the source for the canals. Now, the sea appears to be to the south, and the canals tend to flow toward the south from the north. So it's reasonable to suppose that the River to the north is flowing from up in the mountains.

All of this is consistent with the theory that Cragscleft is in those small northern mountains. Thus, the mining would have taken place there and stretched down on either side of the River just northeast of Shalebridge (which, I take it, spreads onto both banks).

Cragscleft could be located in the eastern mountains that are visible across the River from Eastport, but then it would seem strange to construe Cragscleft as part of the City (or of that portion of the City where Garrett's other adventures seem to unfold).

Needless to say, if Cragscleft is north of the North Quarter in the foothills northeast of Shalebridge, toward the River's remote source, then there's no risk at all that subterranean mines there would bump into the Lost City. The Lost City stretches from just south of Garrett's home and Ramirez Manor all the way to the sea in Dayport.

Here, how 'bout a sketch that shows where the Lost City is, where BUSH & COUR take place, and where the haunted, canal-laced portion of the Old Quarter is. Dayport must be extended south a bit more to accommodate the true scale of Karath-Din, but this gives the gist.

Any significant mining industry in that area would be bound to come through into the lost city sooner or later, especially if the lost city is more extensive than the areas in T1 and T2 (which it almost definately will be - you don't get civilisations like the Precursors on small scales

You seem to believe that the Lost City is the full extent of Precursor Civilization, where in fact it appears only to be the capital. Ancient capitals were often small by today's standards, even in great civilizations.

Aaron Graham's Keeper Theses on the Circle

With respect, Aaron made a bunch of that stuff up out of whole cloth; his details don't necessarily have an evidential basis in the gameworld itself.

If the material in these is to be taken as valid (I think so, they seem an accurate account of, and logical deduction from, the game material) then it's possible that the only recorded unintentional intrusion into the lost city was under Cragscleft during the temple construction

That's one of Graham's inventions. I see no reason to follow it.

(I base this on the following: if a gemstone with necromantic powers is involved in the destruction of the lost city, a gemstone is found in Cragscelft with similar powers

Who says the Eye (or any similar stone) was found in Cragscleft? The presence of zombies isn't automatically an index of Eye-influence. Besides, carefully cut and artfully mounted gemstones are, uhm, seldom found in mines; and if that crafstmanship is Precursorial, then such an artifact wouldn't have been in a mine at all after the fall of Karath-Din. It seems to me that the Eye is a Precursor artifact but was recovered from the Lost City, or a similar site, long after it had been mined, shaped, and used by the Precursors themselves. The chaos at Cragscleft has a more plausible explanation.

So the miners were either very, very lucky or the lost city is a lot deeper that it would appear to be from T1. Or there were no mines. My money is on the latter

I agree, and have asserted above, that the idea of mines running below the City in a pervasive manner, all the way down to Dayport, must be rejected.

Foolish non-believers. You underestimate our powers of anal-retention. We've been working with the same map of The City for 3 games now. It was already there in 1997 when I joined The Dark Project.

To be fair, I'm not sure how religiously everyone's been sticking to it over the years. (Mostly, I think, though.) And there has, of course, been a fair amount of deliberate misinformation in the dialog and text from T/T2. You can't trust everyone in the city. Sometimes they are either dumb or on their own agenda. So, between these 2 things, I can see how your map isn't perfect.

I will point out one major feature that you're lacking though, and it amuses me that never came up explicitly in T/T2. There's a big friggin' river in the city. It runs N-S and splits the city in 2. It joins the ocean to the south.

Keep up the good work. This kind of stuff is always useful to us. It can be hard to keep track of everything we have and have not said (yet).

Hehehe - I think that's thrown the proverbial spanner into the works, Randy. Every hypothesis I've seen has an East-West river [as shown on the map in the Keepers' Grotto, I might mention]. Ah well, back to the drawing board...

Sneaksie Thiefsie

Sneaksie the Thiefsie, with manfoolsie fight
A manfool, a trickster, a bringer of night

Originally posted by Sneaksie Thiefsie:Two points: there is no guaruntee that the gemstone was mounted when found, or even when used by the Precursors. I believe that relics in the era of the Crusades were decorated very ornately when they passed into the hands of the Crusaders, and I think it is not altogether outside of the realms of possibility that the Hammers found the gem, saw something of its powers and decided to decorate it

The only gems we do discover in the buildings at Karath-Din are carefully cut. We also find among the Precursors an unusual diligence in honoring perceived elemental powers through ritualized spaces and behaviors. It seems to me unlikely that such people would leave a potent magical gemstone uncut and unmounted. Meanwhile, we have no evidence at all that the Hammerites engage in gemological crafts at all.

Secondly, the distance of the gem from Karath-Din does not prove that it never existed there.

Oh, I do think it existed there, as I noted. However, I doubt that it has anything to do with Cragscleft.

Earth tremors, such as those that created the mountains, might have moved the gem there. [This theory is very unlikely, but I decided to advance it anyway].

Very unlikely. Good call!

Another possibility was that the gem was buried in the distant mountains in a desperate attempt to rid Karath-Din of its evils. Perhaps it was discovered in the intervening years by farmers, sheperds, etc who moved it to another place before it was lost again.

Perhaps it went through that cycle seven times. Perhaps it was lost only when the moon was full.

I readily admit that a lot of my theses relating to the early period of the City's history have little, if any, basis on facts available within the game.

Thanks for the confirmation.

However, you do me a small injustice by saying that I lack "evidential basis" for my conclusions.

I didn't say that. Indeed, I think many of your inferences do follow from in-game evidence. What I did say, as a careful rereading of my note will confirm, is that your inferences don't necessarily follow from an evidential basis in the game. This means that for any particular claim you offer regarding the City's history and culture, that claim may or may not be grounded in evidence with the sort of rigor that some of us prefer. In other words, caveat lector.

I researched the gameworld thoroughly before I wrote both theses, and tried my best to make the theories fit the facts, a process that I believe succeeded. If you can advance a contrasting thesis that likewise conforms with the facts, I would be happy to read it and debate it with you.

I'm very pleased that you found the gameworld interesting and rewarding enough to study it and attempt to synthesize (and occasionally fabricate) a continuous history. With respect, I disagree with a good number of your inferences for what I reckon are pretty good reasons. Some of your connections or assumptions seem unwarranted or tenuous to me. But perhaps that only means that everyone has to draw the line somewhere, and that I choose to draw it a bit more strictly. That's ok, since it's all in fun, and I hope it's clear that by pointing out these differences I intended no slight.

Originally posted by TheWatcher:One minor problem with the mine theory: The Lost City. That's pretty much slap underneath the new City and at not too huge a depth. It at least stretches from the middle of the City to the sea and probably more: possibly out to the Cragscleft area or beyond. Any significant mining industry in that area would be bound to come through into the lost city sooner or later, especially if the lost city is more extensive than the areas in T1 and T2 (which it almost definately will

I said the City was linked to mining, not that the mines were nearby. They would probably be in the mountains (wherever they are). This means they wouldn't run into the lost city:
|
|mines in mountains
ground level-----------------|
lost city below.

I believe that the docks in the City support the 'mines in the mountains theory' - Coal etc. is mined, transported to the City and then exported accross the sea to other cities.

Grudny - from what Randy said, it seems the river in some of the cutscenes does split the City, rather than there being another town on the other side.
[edit: whoa that little picture didn't work too well ]

I would just like to throw my two cents in. In the Lost city briefing it shows the city, with a river splitting it and a rather large bridge, a couple cutscences feature garrett crossing bridges (he seems to have a thing for this) we know there are canals through the city. I also was thinking, its very possible for the sea to be east and at the same time visible mountains be east. The servant or guard or whatever could be referring to harbor and the moutains beyond...What I am saying is the city could be U shaped, and split onto several islands, sorta like New York City. Just some random thoughts

The Edge of Haven and Hell-My first serious attempt at a level. 10-12% Complete.
"Oh, for the love of all things, DROMED crashed, AGAIN, SON OF A PEANUTBUTTER AND JELLY SANDWHICH! I THINK I AM GOING TO KILL THIS PIECE OF SHI'ITE! GRRRRRR" heard from the office from time to time.

Originally posted by TheKeeperAgent:In the Lost city briefing it shows the city, with a river splitting it and a rather large bridge

Are you sure that's not supposed to be a vision of the Karath-Din prior to its destruction? When that image appears, Garrett isn't discussing the City; he's talking about Karath-Din. Likewise, there's an obelisk in the background, a monument typical of Karath-Din but seen nowhere in the City:

a couple cutscences feature garrett crossing bridges (he seems to have a thing for this) we know there are canals through the city. I also was thinking, its very possible for the sea to be east

I thought so too until Oliver Gregory mentioned the sunrise/mountains issue. And Randy has already confirmed that it's to the south.

at the same time visible mountains be east. The servant or guard or whatever could be referring to harbor and the moutains beyond...What I am saying is the city could be U shaped, and split onto several islands, sorta like New York City.

Can you see mountains in Brooklyn?

Yes, that's possible. But it's unduly complicated. But why posit a peninsula when everything fits nicely with a southward sea?